


After Death or What Severus Never Imagined

by CaptainErica



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angry Lily is so done, James and lily sigh a lot, Who even knows what they believe, Wizard Heaven, do they even have a heaven?, snape is confused but heaven makes your brain all wibbly, they have ghosts so whatever wizard heaven exists here it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-30
Updated: 2015-03-30
Packaged: 2018-03-20 08:30:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3643575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainErica/pseuds/CaptainErica
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's just passed through the thin veil separating his mind from his body and hurtling him into that place 'beyond'. That place that is apparently a white room with a single chair and....James Potter?</p>
            </blockquote>





	After Death or What Severus Never Imagined

When Severus Snape opens his eyes, he is sitting in a chair in what seems to be an otherwise empty room; he knows immediately that he has died.

_Snape materializes onto the chair James had set up when they had heard what happened. He knows that Snape doesn’t notice him at first, so he waits until the man looks in his direction James nods once, “Snape.” He says, his voice flat._

Severus blinks for a couple of moments, his mind twisting and turning and trying to orient itself in this strange new reality. “Potter?” He asks, only a slight amount of malice tingeing the word as his head is still a little confused.

_James nods, he was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, taking in the man before him. It was funny, he was thinking, that Snape was older than they were and actually looked it. He wasn’t all that much older than Sirius, and definitely not much older than Remus, but while James’ two friends looked little older than they had when James had been alive, Snape looked a number of years older. It was an interesting thought, but James didn’t have too much time to think about it._

Severus starts to feel a little uncomfortable. Not only was _Potter_ here, in **his heaven** (is that how this works? Does he get his own heaven?), but Potter was being very silent. The silence is broken when Potter lets out a deep breath.

_James puffs out his cheeks and lets out the breath before casting his eyes toward Snape. “So, I thought I would have a lot to say…but, I really don’t.” He says, and his voice is just as calm as he feels and he’s only a little disappointed because he’d thought he had feelings about this whole situation._

Severus feels a little flutter of relief wash over him after that pronouncement; and it's strange because he really shouldn’t care what Potter thinks. He never did, and had thought that he never would, giant awful prat that Potter was.

_James darts a look at the door at the far end, once, twice, too many times and he knows Snape will have noticed._

Potter keeps looking at the door, and Severus can't help but to notice. "What?" he starts but Potter raises one hand and something about that gesture actually makes him stop and stay silent. He feels like there must still be something muddling his thoughts.

_"We've been here 16 ish years, you know?" and Snape winces slightly but James just keeps talking "and I wasn't angry with you, even when I found out what you had done to us and how you had reacted to our passing. I was disturbed, yeah, but not angry, you know? ‘Cause it was sad." James sighs and looks down, his eyes darting to the door again._

And Severus feels a bit offended, but then feels stupid for that feeling because he's _older_ than Potter, he _knows_ how to control himself; knows that he shouldn’t let Potter get to him. But Potter isn't paying attention to him, he's got a furrow to his brow and he's looking down and he lets out another sigh, and this Potter is very different from the Potter he remembers. This Potter is so much different from the one he interacted with in 5th year. It’s odd, he thinks…

_"But I'm mostly sorry for you, so there's that." James says, looking back up at Snape and noting the confused look settled rather snugly across his face._

There's a pounding on the door, and Severus feels himself panic, wondering if next will be Black and he doesn't think he wants to deal with that if he's already _emoting_ over Potter. Potter pushes off the wall in that infuriatingly casual way that Severus had always hated, and shrugs toward Severus like 'sorry mate dunno what to tell ya' and then opens the door and crowds his way out, as if he were blocking someone from coming in for a moment.

Severus hears whispering and then a flash of red hair and white skin has pushed into the room and shut the door tightly behind them and his breath catches because she's exactly as he remembers. Exactly as his memories had kept her. But what hurts him the most is that the look in Lily's eyes when she turns around reminds him rather strikingly of her son. The glint of steel in her eyes and the firm set to her mouth.

And this is a look that _James_ had never had, but _Lily_ most certainly had and Severus can’t believe he hadn’t recognized it on her son’s face.

_She's silent for a moment as she situates herself, her arms crossed over her chest and her stance ramrod straight. Lily had imagined that it would be hard to face Severus again, but she wasn’t certain she had gauged her anger properly; she was a lot angrier than she had thought she would be. She takes a deep breath, levels her eyes on the wall across from her, and speaks “I am horrified, and_ mortified _at what you did" she takes another breath and grits her teeth._

She is the absolute opposite of what _James_ had been, and Severus has his eyes locked on her, drinking her in.

_“And I'm even more so because you supposedly did it all in my name as if I would approve of what you did. As if your actions under Dumbledore’s command could absolve your guilt. As if your **horrible maltreatment** of children, your own students, was at all going to be skipped over or go unnoticed by anybody."_

She's ranting, and he remembers her rants fondly. His eyes soften as she takes a breath and the memories start to flow over him. Her passion was always flowing from her in waves, just as they were now. For some reason, though, the memory starts to feel tainted and his only thought as to why is that the Lily in front of him won't look at him, or acknowledge his presence outside of her words. It was slowly (very slowly) getting harder and harder to keep that picture of the young girl he was in love with in his head.

_"I don't know what you were thinking. I most certainly don't know why anyone would let you continue to think it. But I'm not amused, and I haven’t been since the moment I saw you ignoring my crying child and **cradling my dead body**. If you’d truly cared about me, truly loved me, you would have recognized that my child’s happiness would have meant more to me than anything…" Lily breaks off suddenly and takes a deep breath, lets it out, looks down and away toward the door._

And Snape realizes that _James_ is probably standing behind the door, waiting for Lily to leave. Waiting for Lily to finally be done with Severus. It hurts. It’s a sharp and sudden pain, but then, Severus is kind of slowly starting to realize that she had been done with him before they left school. It’s crazy for him to be thinking like this, for these thoughts to suddenly be settling in and taking root, but he supposes that time must work differently here; maybe his mind is working faster.

_Lily sighs, "I promised my husband that I wouldn't slap you." she whispers, and then she lets out a small chuckle, "didn't promise not to punch you, but I think he knows better than to try and cover all his bases like that." She lets out a soft snort of air and glances at the door briefly before leveling her eyes on Severus for the first time since she had walked into the room. She feels nothing. "I'm not going to, you know. But I wanted to. Oh there were so many times that I wanted to, Severus. I'm so disappointed, I'm so disheartened." She shakes her head and then lets out a deep breath._

"I'm done. This is the official end." She turns and walks out. Severus feels a little bit like he should say something to defend himself before she makes it to the door, but then, a part of him knows that there is nothing he can say to defend himself to her. There is a part of him that is just left speechless. There is something that he just can’t place that keeps him silent and sitting in that chair; uncertain what happens next but certain that it probably isn’t what he might have imagined.

~*~the end~*~


End file.
